Green Dragon, Market Lavington, Wiltshire

Market Lavington is a civil parish and large village with a population of about 2,200 on the northern edge of Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, 5 miles south of the market town of Devizes.

The village is not short of amenities and alongside the Green Dragon pub on the High Street it boasts a Co-op supermarket, a pharmacist, a butcher, a post office, a florist, a hairdresser, a café and other small businesses. There is also a nursing and residential home.

Steve and Nicky Wragg have been running the Wadworth Brewery tenancy for fifteen and a half years. It is the only pub left in the village and is well supported by the local community and surrounding area.

The Green Dragon has accommodation and serves food daily with quality real ales brewed locally. Staff are friendly and always willing to help, making this an asset to the village and a place where clubs and local folk can get together.

Project Outline:

Steve and Nicky have been keen to create a space for their rural community as well as providing a useful service. They contacted Pub is The Hub for advice and the regional advisor, Reg Clarke, has helped them to pull the scheme together with support from Wiltshire County Council. In addition, Pub is The Hub has supported the scheme with a small grant from their own Community Services Fund.

Situated in the pub’s function room and skittle alley to the rear of the pub, the team have created a digital hub that comprises a laptop computer, printer, big screen TV and three hand-held tablets with free WiFi connection. They are available for anyone who needs access to services like browsing the internet, printing documents or downloading a book or newspaper. All the pub’s food and drink facilities will be available as well.

Outcomes so far:

• The first digital training session was hosted by a local Wiltshire Charity called Wordfest that supports adult literacy in the county.
• This project has lifted community spirits and it aims to help towards combating isolation for individuals in the village.

Lessons to Learn:

Although this was a relatively straight-forward project to complete, it still needed the combined efforts of the licensees and their pub, support from the local community, Wiltshire County Council, Wadworth Brewery and a local IT supplier pull the project together.